Chapter 13 Ares
ARES
The car windows had fogged up, and Eryx’s eyes were still milky white from the spirit he channeled inside the Automat.
We sat in a nondescript town car over a block away, watching the three women talk, listening to their conversation emanate from Eryx like he was a radio.
It was an unnerving talent. Rare and special, like Av’s ability to bond with spirits, or my exceptional talent for exorcism and auric manipulation.
The three of us had always flown as far under the radar as we possibly could, downplaying our abilities since we were children. There was a pervasive ethos in parapsych communities around how much of your talent you displayed. The less humans knew about what you could do, the better off you were.
From the back seat, I reached forward and shook Eryx’s shoulder. “I’ve heard enough.”
Av frowned, twisting in her seat to argue with me, her brows raising into the thick fringe of her dark bangs. “But Ares—”
“The girl from 88th and Vine,” I interrupted. “Where did she end up?”
Av’s eyebrows shot higher as Eryx’s eyes cleared. “She’s one of them. One of the talented they were talking about...” The wheels in Av’s head turned before my eyes as she came to the same conclusion I had. If what we’d heard the Maere discuss was true, that girl was in grave danger.
Eryx licked his lips a few times. His mouth was always dry after he channeled a spirit.
I handed him a glass bottle full of electrolyte infused water from the stash we kept stored in the console of the back seat.
He gulped some down, and then asked, “If Lara didn’t kill the stepmother, could it have been a frame job? ”
I threw my hands up in frustration. “You heard what they said. This Mother, whoever she is, has multiple operatives. If the girl is in some kind of danger, do you want to find out the hard way?”
From the front seat, Eryx shook his head. The three of us knew all too well what it meant to be just a little more talented than the average parapsych. If the girl fit into the category the Maere discussed, then she wasn’t safe, even with my best team watching her.
Av started the car as Eryx rattled off the address. I whipped out my phone, pulling up the number for one of the few people in Trinity leadership that I trusted besides Lux. The phone rang before I could change my mind. As Av wove through the dark city streets, rain spattered on the windshield.
Eli Cabot answered after just three rings. Unusually fast for his grumpy ass. “Lux said you’d call.”
I wasn’t surprised she’d known I’d call Eli.
She was more in tune with me than most, and it made her predisposed to seeing into my immediate future.
Lux, Eli and I were old friends. Aside from Eryx and Av, they were some of the few people in this cursed world I actually related to—because like my brother and Avaline, they were both just a little too talented for their own good.
We held common ground and a long history that made it easier to place faith in them.
That made it easier than with other people who had less to risk.
You trust Ember too, that pesky voice at the back of my mind taunted me.
I pushed it aside, not wanting to consider the particulars of why I had so much confidence in her.
“I need a favor,” I said, hoping Eli wouldn’t be too much trouble. He could be rather prickly.
“And I owe you one,” Eli said. “One, Necroline.”
There was the prickliness, and the reminder that our long years of friendship didn’t extend so far as un-owed favors. That was fine. It was enough. Eryx showed me his phone, and the address we were headed to. I nodded. “I need to move fast and the ability to make a teenage girl disappear.”
Eli didn’t ask for more information. The thaumaturge knew how this worked.
The less any of us knew about what the others did, the safer we all remained.
With that safety came loss. The less the Trinity trusted each other, the less likely it was that we’d ever get out from under the Authority’s—or even the Consulate’s—thumb.
And that, of course, was the point of hunting us for centuries—leaving just enough of us alive that we could still do the humans some good, but shattering our ability to trust one another so thoroughly that they could rule us by sheer force of their numbers against ours.
It wasn’t as if any of this was a surprise, but if the girl had some kind of hidden talent, she was important.
Saving her life meant pushing back. It meant showing the tangled knots of power, where the Authority and the Consulate intersected, that we were more than just pawns in their unending quest for control.
Though Eli did not respond, I heard the unmistakable noise of a struck match, of a spirit candle sizzling to life, and of the low hum of the thaumaturge speaking to the universe…
or whatever it was that he did. That was another of the problems with the way things were—the secrets of parapsych talents were locked down by each of the dynasties in the Trinity.
We didn’t share knowledge about how our power worked. Ever. Very few things were even written down anymore. There were just too many ways for what we could do to be used against us.
“One hour,” Eli said after a long moment of silence. “You, Eryx, and Av have one hour to do what you need to. You should be able to move with speed, though to do the three of you, I can’t make you invisible.”
“What about the girl?” I asked.
“When you find her, tell her ‘the Angel hears your plea’ and she will become invisible until you reach safety.”
My heartbeat slowed, sounding for all the world like the drums of old inside my mind. “Where did you pull that phrase from?”
Eli made a noncommittal noise before delivering a sham of an answer. “You know I can’t say.”
“Right,” I replied, doing my best to suppress the snarl of frustration caught in my throat. “Thanks.”
“My debt is cleared.” Eli’s tone was suddenly formal.
“Sure,” I replied absently. “If that makes you feel better.”
“What’s going on?” Eli asked. “Really?”
The fact that he had the gall to ask after telling me his debt was cleared was grating. If Eli Cabot wanted to be a curmudgeon that was his business, but I couldn’t handle the emotional whiplash right now.
“Ask Lux, since she knows so much.” My tone was clipped as I hung up. I’d lost my patience. “We have an hour to get the girl somewhere safe.”
Av looked back at the Automat, watching the three ancient warriors with their heads bent towards one another. “Do you think they can do it?” she whispered.
“What?” I asked, annoyed that she hadn’t started the car yet. I tried to tell myself that it was talking to Eli that got me worked up, but the thorn in my side was Ember Verona. The damn woman put me off my equilibrium.
“Get their swords back—become who they were meant to be again,” Av replied, her voice harboring a wistfully soft note.
Eryx watched her, his eyes narrowing slightly as his brow furrowed. He was worried about her. Whatever that emotion she displayed was, it concerned my brother. And thus should concern me. It did, but we were out of time.
“Av.” I leaned forward, touching her arm as gently as I could. “We don’t have much time. Get us to where you stashed the girl.”
What was this longing she had for the Maere? Av had been like this ever since she discovered what the auction’s theme would be. I tried to make eye contact with Eryx, but he wouldn’t look my way.
She nodded, but her gaze stayed on the Automat. “We should ask them to help us.”
I sighed. If only we could. In another version of this world, perhaps.
But the Trinity and the Maere had been at delicate odds for centuries.
The Consulate was a necessary evil, one we could not forego if we wanted to survive the Authority.
But it was hard to ignore how much damage it had done, how sometimes it felt like the Consulate was working against us as much as the Authority was.
I followed Av’s gaze. The three women in the Automat were different somehow. They always had been.
When they had their swords, they had been better.
Things had been better for all of us. I hadn’t realized it til they broke apart.
Til the five Orphium Maere had turned to one lonely, desperate woman.
The feeling that I’d played a part in fucking all that up chased me down, eliciting a lump in my throat I could hardly swallow.
“We can’t,” I murmured, feeling distracted. If only we could band together, we would be an even match for the Authority and the sheer numbers the humans had against us.
That kernel of hope wormed its way into my heart, but I dug it out, tossing it aside before it had the chance to germinate. Hope was fickle—dangerous. “Drive, please.”
Av nodded, starting the car. Eryx glanced back at me in the rearview mirror.
He knew as well as I did that underneath Av’s icy exterior beat the heart of an idealist—that our girl held out hope for a better world, even when the rest of us could not.
She pulled away from the curb, and I could feel her disappointment, heavy and desperate.
For all the times she’d been right about things and I hadn’t been able to listen, surreptitiously, I slid my phone out of my pocket. I found Ember Verona’s phone number and sent a single text: Could use some help.
Then I pulled the pin on our geolocation for the girl and sent it to Ember as well.
If Av was right and we needed them, then I didn’t want to make another mistake.
When it came to Orphium’s Maere, I’d failed to listen to Av one too many times.
It sent dread through me to ask them for anything, but I convinced myself I was doing this for Av.
Because if it was for me, then I was too far gone. If I let myself need Ember Verona, I was lost.